Read Online Promises of Home by Jeff Abbott - Free Book Online
Authors: Jeff Abbott
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I’m so glad you’re here. Seeing everyone who loved Clevey is making this easier for me to bear. And what a lovely cobbler.” Her manners weren’t going to be dented by tragedy.
“Miz Shivers. I’m so terribly, terribly sorry,” I whispered into her frizz of hair. I hugged her tight. She’d always been really considerate to me and I remembered her many kindnesses since Mama had gotten ill. She didn’t deserve this grief, and for the first time I felt a hot anger overcome my shock. I didn’t want this kindhearted woman to feel the horrible pain of losing her child.
She pulled back and touched my cheek. “He was always so fond of you. You made him laugh, you know.”
“He made us all laugh, Miz Shivers.” God, I didn’t know what to say. I’d spent most of my childhood around Clevey, but a wall had gone up between us when I’d gone off to Rice and he’d stayed in Mirabeau, working at the paper. A college degree not only opens doors; it closes them. But that had been Clevey’s choice, not mine. I didn’t spend the time with him I had as a child, but as grown men, we were too busy to sit, cuss, and smoke in tree houses.
Truda Shivers leaned against me and whispered, “Walk with me for a moment, Jordan.” She murmured a pardon to the other ladies; one woman took the cobbler pan from my hands, and I put my arm around Truda’s shoulders. She guided me to a wall of photographs, not terribly unlike theone my mother had created in our house: a gallery of her family’s lives. Various versions of Clevey smiled at me from the wall.
She pointed at a photo of several of us boys from our senior year in high school. The good old gang, arms looped over each others’ shoulders, posing in the back of Clevey’s battered pickup. I sat between Trey and Clevey, smiling broadly with my hometown brotherhood, someone else’s Stetson perched on my head. Trey had one hand affectionately on the top of the hat; Clevey held a beer in one hand and crossed his eyes for the camera. Davis, Junebug, and Ed stood behind us, brandishing beers and laughing. I remembered the picture; it was at a graduation party Davis hosted, when the drinking age was eighteen and we were all legal. The hat on my head was Trey’s and I recalled he’d joked I never cared to wear a cowboy hat and damned if we wouldn’t get a picture of me in one. He’d pulled off his hat and put it on me. We all looked full of joy, if not promise. My breath felt heavy in my lungs and I looked away.
“Clevey”—she sighed—“sure did love high school. I think it was the high point of his life.”
“Yes, ma’am.” I didn’t know what to say. Holding Mirabeau High as the pinnacle of one’s time on earth saddened me.
Truda saw my thought in my face. “It was, Jordan, it was. But that’s okay. My Clevey was never what you’d call a complicated boy.” She pointed at another photo: Clevey and I uncomfortable in suits, with the bishop standing imperially behind us, our hair combed smooth, his holy hands on our shoulders, guiding our little souls among the straight and narrow. A picture from our confirmation Eucharist. I remembered the bishop smelled of peppermint and his palms were not callused like my daddy’s. Truda’s hand tightened on mine.
“Those two pictures are the biggest helps to me right now,” she said, finally crying. “Knowing that he had true friends that loved him and that he’s gone home to God.” She took a ragged breath and her broad shoulders heaved.
“Why? Why would someone kill my boy?” She sobbed hard into my jacket, and I stood there, awkwardly, wishing to God I could just give her an answer that would help heal her heart. But there wasn’t one. Instead I just hugged her for a long while, feeling the surge of her grieving breaths subside as she wept herself out.
After several minutes, one of the other ladies—I thought she was Mrs. Shivers’s sister from La Grange—gently pried her off my shoulder and guided her into
“Miz Shivers. I’m so terribly, terribly sorry,” I whispered into her frizz of hair. I hugged her tight. She’d always been really considerate to me and I remembered her many kindnesses since Mama had gotten ill. She didn’t deserve this grief, and for the first time I felt a hot anger overcome my shock. I didn’t want this kindhearted woman to feel the horrible pain of losing her child.
She pulled back and touched my cheek. “He was always so fond of you. You made him laugh, you know.”
“He made us all laugh, Miz Shivers.” God, I didn’t know what to say. I’d spent most of my childhood around Clevey, but a wall had gone up between us when I’d gone off to Rice and he’d stayed in Mirabeau, working at the paper. A college degree not only opens doors; it closes them. But that had been Clevey’s choice, not mine. I didn’t spend the time with him I had as a child, but as grown men, we were too busy to sit, cuss, and smoke in tree houses.
Truda Shivers leaned against me and whispered, “Walk with me for a moment, Jordan.” She murmured a pardon to the other ladies; one woman took the cobbler pan from my hands, and I put my arm around Truda’s shoulders. She guided me to a wall of photographs, not terribly unlike theone my mother had created in our house: a gallery of her family’s lives. Various versions of Clevey smiled at me from the wall.
She pointed at a photo of several of us boys from our senior year in high school. The good old gang, arms looped over each others’ shoulders, posing in the back of Clevey’s battered pickup. I sat between Trey and Clevey, smiling broadly with my hometown brotherhood, someone else’s Stetson perched on my head. Trey had one hand affectionately on the top of the hat; Clevey held a beer in one hand and crossed his eyes for the camera. Davis, Junebug, and Ed stood behind us, brandishing beers and laughing. I remembered the picture; it was at a graduation party Davis hosted, when the drinking age was eighteen and we were all legal. The hat on my head was Trey’s and I recalled he’d joked I never cared to wear a cowboy hat and damned if we wouldn’t get a picture of me in one. He’d pulled off his hat and put it on me. We all looked full of joy, if not promise. My breath felt heavy in my lungs and I looked away.
“Clevey”—she sighed—“sure did love high school. I think it was the high point of his life.”
“Yes, ma’am.” I didn’t know what to say. Holding Mirabeau High as the pinnacle of one’s time on earth saddened me.
Truda saw my thought in my face. “It was, Jordan, it was. But that’s okay. My Clevey was never what you’d call a complicated boy.” She pointed at another photo: Clevey and I uncomfortable in suits, with the bishop standing imperially behind us, our hair combed smooth, his holy hands on our shoulders, guiding our little souls among the straight and narrow. A picture from our confirmation Eucharist. I remembered the bishop smelled of peppermint and his palms were not callused like my daddy’s. Truda’s hand tightened on mine.
“Those two pictures are the biggest helps to me right now,” she said, finally crying. “Knowing that he had true friends that loved him and that he’s gone home to God.” She took a ragged breath and her broad shoulders heaved.
“Why? Why would someone kill my boy?” She sobbed hard into my jacket, and I stood there, awkwardly, wishing to God I could just give her an answer that would help heal her heart. But there wasn’t one. Instead I just hugged her for a long while, feeling the surge of her grieving breaths subside as she wept herself out.
After several minutes, one of the other ladies—I thought she was Mrs. Shivers’s sister from La Grange—gently pried her off my shoulder and guided her into
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